Scrutiny Over Photos Said to Tie Russia Units to Ukraine

WASHINGTON — A collection of photographs that Ukraine says shows the presence of Russian forces in the eastern part of the country, and which the United States cited as evidence of Russian involvement, has come under scrutiny.

The photographs were submitted by Ukraine last week to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, an organization in Vienna that has been monitoring the situation in Ukraine.

Some of the photographs were also provided by American officials to Secretary of State John Kerry so he could show them when he met in Geneva last Thursday with his counterparts from the European Union, Russia and Ukraine.

One series of photographs depicts what Ukraine described as a “soldier of the Russian Special Forces identified in Slovyansk and Kramatorsk during the assault of administration buildings.”

Vyachislav Ponomaryov, the de facto mayor of Slovyansk, who was ushered into office by pro-Russian militants, acknowledged in a news conference on Tuesday that armed men had come to his town from outside Ukraine but vociferously denied that they were Russian Special Forces.

“Not one serviceman of the Russian Federation is on the territory of Slovyansk,” Mr. Ponomaryov said.

“We don’t have any direct contact with the special services of the Russian Federation,” he said. “Everyone you see here in the militia are my friends, my brothers, my allies in the battle with fascism. We have volunteers who came to us from Moldova, from Russia, from Belarus, from Kazakhstan, from the North Caucasus.”

Another series of photographs in the Ukrainian presentation shows a uniformed man with a long beard who was photographed this year in Slovyansk and Kramatorsk and who, the Ukrainians assert, was also photographed during Russian combat operations in Georgia in 2008, wearing a Special Forces patch.

Asked about the soldier, Mr. Ponomaryov said he was a close friend but added that he did not know if the man, whom he declined to name, had fought in Georgia.

“I cannot rule it out,” he said in an interview. “He has a good background. He is one of my old friends. I have good friends in South Ossetia and in Grozny.”

Some observers have asked whether the man photographed in Georgia is the same person photographed in eastern Ukraine.

Another question has been raised about a group photograph of uniformed men who are identified in the Ukrainian submission as a “sabotage-reconnaissance group” that reports to the “General Staff of the Russian armed forces.”

The Ukrainian submission to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe does not identify where the group photograph was taken but asserts that one prominently featured soldier was involved in operations in eastern Ukraine.

A packet of American briefing materials that was prepared for the Geneva meeting asserts that the photograph was taken in Russia. The same men are also shown in photographs taken in Ukraine. Their appearance in both photographs was presented as evidence of Russian involvement in eastern Ukraine. The packet was later provided by American officials to The New York Times, which included that description of the group photograph in an article and caption that was published on Monday.

The Western allegations that Russia has intervened in Ukraine are based on NATO’s analysis of the tactics employed by armed groups in eastern Ukraine; Ukraine’s assertion that it has arrested several Russian intelligence officers; the accounts of local residents and news media reports; and classified information. But the dispute over the group photograph cast a cloud over one particularly vivid and highly publicized piece of evidence.

Maxim Dondyuk, a freelance photographer who was working in Slovyansk principally for the Russian newsmagazine Russian Reporter, said that he had taken the group photograph there and posted it on his Instagram account.

“It was taken in Slovyansk,” he said in a telephone interview. “Nobody asked my permission to use this photograph.”

Jen Psaki, a State Department spokeswoman, acknowledged that the assertion that the photograph in the American briefing materials had been taken in Russia was incorrect. But she said that the photograph was included in a “draft version” of a briefing packet and that the information has since been corrected. This photograph, she said, was not among those presented by Mr. Kerry in Geneva.

Still, Ms. Psaki asserted that there was considerable classified and unclassified information that had led the United States and its Western allies to “make a connection between the Russians and the armed militants” in eastern Ukraine.

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A9 of the New York edition with the headline: Scrutiny Over Photos Said to Tie Russia Units to Ukraine. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe